


The White Queen's Quest

by Trobadora



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV), Once Upon a Time in Wonderland (TV)
Genre: Canon Divergence, F/M, Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-22
Updated: 2015-08-22
Packaged: 2018-04-14 21:56:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4581534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trobadora/pseuds/Trobadora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"You can't be a Queen, you know, till you've passed the proper examination. And the sooner we begin, the better."</i> (<i>Through the Looking Glass</i>, Lewis Carroll)</p><p>Anastasia has lost Will Scarlet once before. When he vanishes again, what will she do?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: Will Scarlet

**Author's Note:**

  * For [finkpishnets](https://archiveofourown.org/users/finkpishnets/gifts).



> Many thanks to M. for some last-minute help!

The White Rabbit lies broken on floor, his head surrounded by a puddle of his own blood, the red stark against the black-and-white of the checkerboard tiles. His fur is matted with the wet of it.

He'd got in the way of the Duchess's spell, black dots of magic swirling in a buzzing cloud, spreading a peppery smell.

Got in the way, but not enough to stop it: the remains of the spell fly through the air, undeterred, hitting Anastasia square in the chest.

"Ana!" Will screams, futile and pointless. Her eyes, her mouth are wide as she is thrown back against a pillar with force. Peppercorn spots of dark magic bloom and grow, spreading over her dress, her neck, her face - -

His vision clouds purple.

In the blink of an eye, the White Queen's castle turns into a tarmacked street. There's a faint smell of fumes and seawater, and all around him are people looking around themselves in confusion, just like Will.

He looks down at himself. His embroidered waistcoat has been replaced with a familiar leather jacket - that should be hanging in a closet, in a castle, in a different realm. He doesn't wear it much, any more. Not that he doesn't like it; it's comfy and all, but it belongs to a time and a place without Ana.

Storybrooke.

And now he's back in it, without so much as a by-your-leave. _Cheers for that, mate._

Although ...

A wild hope clenches his heart, his lungs, his throat. What if they're _all_ here? What if Ana was pulled away from the magic overwhelming her, to this land without magic?

_What if she's safe, after all?_

Will does what everyone seems to be doing: he starts moving with purpose, moves out to search the town for his loved ones.

  


* * *

  


Will scuffs his boots, drags his heels.

_No point, mate. Get a move on._

Lips pressed together, eyes burning, he forces himself into motion again, leaving the hospital behind. His last hope - yeah, right. He'd known he wouldn't find Ana here, any more than any other place in this bloody town. Whatever's happening, looks like he's here only because he was here before. No one else is.

So - they're all still back there, the White Rabbit in his blood and Ana in a cloud of the duchess's magic. So - the Duchess won, then. Ana is gone. The Rabbit is gone. And Will's gone too, in a different way, gone so far he'll never find a way back.

Not that there'd be much of a point, going back. There's nothing left there. Everything that mattered is gone, lost and gone.

Well, there's Alice, but she's in her own world and time with her own family, and with no Rabbit ...

Might as well be dead, all of them. No one's coming for Will this time. And he's back to being empty, lost and alone.

Except this time he has his heart. Will almost wishes he knew how to take it out of his chest. It had been so much easier, without ...

The pain's all that's left of Ana, though. He'll hold it tight. He owes it to her.

To her memory.

Will angrily wipes his face with the back of his hand.

Bugger all this for a lark. White King - ha! Husband - ha! He's a thief; he'll do what a thief does.

It's all he's got now.


	2. Part 1: Anastasia

_Pepperpots were chasing her down the hallway. Anastasia ran as fast as she could, occasionally pelted in the back by peppercorns thrown at her by her pursuers. Out through a wide, open archway and into a maze. She turned corners this way and that, scratching herself on the thorny hedge, but the pepperpots always kept up, always just a corner behind her. There was an eerie sniffling sound coming from the hedge, and a peppery smell in the air._

_Ana kept turning, running, racing, until she was suddenly running across a wide open space somewhere in the middle of the maze. The maze was different, the sounds and the smell were different, but it was familiar all the same._

_Will was there, made of stone._

_She rushed towards him, but just as she reached, he burst apart into a cloud of pepper. Ana stared, eyes wide, until the pepper hit her, and she sneezed._

Ana sat up with a gasp. Her heart thudded heavily in her chest. Her back felt bruised, but she could move without too much pain. And she was sure the whiff of pepper in her nose was just memory. Wasn't it?

She sneezed again.

Feeling a bit silly, she sniffed her own arm. She was still wearing the quilted white underdress she'd had on under her lavender gown, but someone had taken off the gown itself and her shoes. Lifting a fold of her dress, she sniffed it too.

No; there was a smell of fabric and laundry soap and a little bit of new sweat, but no pepper to it. Ana sighed in relief. 

Then, simultaneously, two realisations hit: one, Will had vanished right before her eyes. That hadn't been imagination, or a dream. She'd seen it. And two, she could still hear sniffling.

She clenched her fists and sucked in her stomach against the wave of grief and terror radiating out from inside. Ana swung her feet to the floor, wincing at the way it tore at her back. Carefully, quietly, she climbed out of her bed - large and empty without Will - and followed the sniffling sound. It came from the drapes gathered back from the window.

With a quick jerk, she pulled the heavy fabric aside. The fireball in her other hand died.

There, curled into the corner, sat a tiny rabbit girl, arms and ears wrapped around her knees, sniffling into her skirt.

Ana stared down blindly at her for a long moment. " _What_ are you doing here?" she snapped.

The girl threw her a frightened look and sniffled harder.

The mess of emotion in Ana's gut turn to seething. Will was gone - if anyone, _she_ should be the one crying in a corner. What did that girl have to sniffle about? 

Then she remembered the Rabbit. He'd been struck by the Duchess's magic, too, jumping into the way of the curse-cloud - and unlike her, he hadn't found a last-minute magical defence. He'd sneezed out blood immediately, might have sneezed out his lungs entirely, after that, when she'd been too busy dodging the rest of the peppery attack to see.

Oh.

_Oh._

With an effort, Ana lowered herself to the floor, trying not to wince at the strain to her back, trying not to lose her grip on her own grief. She reached out a hand to the girl, but didn't touch. "Little one?" she said, as gently as she could manage.

The little rabbit girl blinked up at her, eyes wide and wet. "I'm sorry, Your Majesty," she said, wiping her sleeve across her nose. "It's my papa." And then the tears rolled again.

Ana bit down on her lip; then she bent further down to lift the girl into her arms. "Come here," she said. "I'll take you to your mummy, okay?"

The girl nodded at her, wetly, her long ears flapping with the movement. Her whiskers were drooping, and the fur under her eyes was soaked. Ana pulled out an embroidered handkerchief and dried the girl's face as she carried her outside.

  


* * *

  


"My Queen!" Tweedledum rushed towards her. "Are you all right? We didn't know - you didn't bleed, but you were hit, by the spell, and ... Oh, everything's a dreadful mess, I'm so sorry ..." His painted face looked drawn, the patterns smudged - he clearly hadn't rested since the attack. He seemed distraught and unsure of himself, on top of the obvious exhaustion.

He looked her over, a little strangely, and Ana realised she was walking around in her underdress. Never mind that now, though. 

"I managed to break down the magic before it could do damage," she said, absent-mindedly answering his unspoken question. "I didn't know I could do that until it hit me ..." Which should be a triumph, shouldn't it? But she'd lost anyway. Somehow, _somehow_ , the Duchess must have found a way to strike at her weakest spot, and had got to Will. 

Or perhaps ...

"What about Will?" she asked, sharply, trying not to hope.

The Tweedle's face fell. "Your Majesty," he said gently, "it appears that someone has stolen the King."

No. _No._ She couldn't do that again. She couldn't lose him again. She _couldn't_. Everything went very white around her, blurring and empty and meaningless.

Then suddenly the Tweedle was by her side, patting her shoulder awkwardly. She'd blanked out completely, hadn't even felt him approach.

That just wouldn't do. She had to do something. Anything. 

In her arms, the rabbit girl shifted, and Ana looked down at her. "The Rabbit," she said. "Is the Rabbit ..."

She couldn't bring herself to say _dead_ , but she didn't have to. Tweedledum interrupted, "Very hurt, Your Majesty, very damaged. He hasn't regained consciousness yet. But his healer-wife, she says he only got a partial sniff of the curse-cloud, and she believes he'll live."

The girl in Ana's arms burst into tears again. The dark part of her wanted to sneer. What did the girl have to cry about? The White Rabbit would no doubt be fine. It was Will that was gone, stolen from her. 

She felt like she was about to vibrate out of her skin. She needed to do something. Anything.

"Where are they?" she asked. "I'll go see them."

"In the Polka-Dot Suite, Your Majesty," Tweedledum asked. "Shall I ..."

Ana refused the Tweedle's proffered arm and set off down the corridor, stiffly at first but soon settling once again into the rhythm of twinges in her bruised back. She pulled the Rabbit's daughter more firmly against her and lengthened her stride.

Her thoughts were whirring. She had to see the Rabbit first, yes, and then she would ... she would ...

She would think of something, then.

  


* * *

  


The White Rabbit lay small and broken on the large, human-sized bed, lost under the polka-dot patterns of the quilt. His grey-furred wife was sitting beside him on the pillow, hands clenched tightly together, but she jumped up when Anastasia came in, the Tweedle hovering awkwardly at her back. Her eyes went wide when she saw her daughter in Ana's arms.

"Thank you," she said as she reached out to take the girl. Ana handed her over stiffly, and the woman looked at Anastasia, a shrewd expression on her face. 

Ana nodded curtly. "How is he?" she demanded, pointing towards the unconscious White Rabbit with a tilt of the head.

The rabbit-woman's expression softened as she looked down at her husband, her daughter held close in her arms. There was no blood on him now; no doubt she'd cleaned him up herself. "Percy ..." She trailed off, then rallied. "I believe he will recover. But I'm no sorcerer; I don't know if there's still something of the Duchess's magic in him." Her grief-darkened eyes flicked up to Ana's.

Ana stepped closer and ran a hand over the still form, bright magic flowing from her palm - the same she'd used to unmake the Duchess's magic in her own body. It swept through, unhindered. "Nothing," she said abruptly. If only finding Will could be this easy ...

It was a vicious bit of magic, what the Duchess had come up with. The peppery spell cloud was her favourite, but she couldn't use it too often; cooking it up took time, and the batches were small.

Little comfort, but something. And now that Ana knew how to defend against it ... well. Let her try and use it against the White Queen again. _You just try._

"She'll use it again," the grey-furred rabbit-woman said, dully, as if answering Ana's thoughts.

"I'll find her," Ana snarled. "And then I'll turn her into the pig that she is and _roast her_."

The Grey Rabbit didn't look much cheered by that announcement, and she turned fully towards Anastasia, her eyes calculating. 

"She took Will." It wasn't until the words were out of her mouth that Ana realised they were a defence. Defence against an unspoken accusation. Ana clenched down harshly on her furious grief, barely keeping it check. An accusation she deserved, perhaps.

Ana forced a deep breath into her lungs, and out again. In, and out. "I can make up a wider defence," she heard herself saying. "Now that I know how."

A furry hand lifted towards her, then sank down again. "Everyone will be glad to hear that." 

Ana winced.

Behind her, Tweedledum cleared his throat. "Your Majesty, if you could announce that at the Council meeting tomorrow -"

She felt like screaming. Council! She had no time for meetings. She needed to find Will. And destroy the Duchess. Rushing at her, squeezing Will's whereabouts out of her - that sounded good to her right now. Not another Council session with allies and advisers and people who wouldn't even _care_ -

With Will lost, how could she even think of anything but finding him?

 _Wait._ Lost. Lost and found ... The Lost-and-Found, that little magical compass of Alice's always pointing to whatever - or whomever - you wanted to find most. That had to be around somewhere, still ...

"Your Majesty?" 

It was the Tweedle, tentatively, and Ana realised she'd blanked out again. Ana nearly snapped at him, nearly rushed out the door straight away.

She'd worked hard to build that Council, though. Few of Wonderland's powerful had been willing to treat in good faith with the former Red Queen, at the start. But she'd made herself over, and she'd known she'd need them if she was to make a difference here. For ordinary people - for most of her subjects - Will had been the one to talk, to make them listen ...

"Yes," she made herself say. "I'll do that. Thank you, darling." She suppressed a wince at the hint of the Red Queen in her voice, but then, that _had_ been her mask against grief, for a long time. 

Was there even a White Queen without Will? Was there even an Anastasia?

  


* * *

  


She'd almost run down the corridor, despite her protesting back, but before the doors she stopped. Her hands clenched into fists, the right around a damp handkerchief, fingernails of the left biting into her palm. 

Eyes raw, Ana steeled herself to go into Alice's rooms, the ones she and her former genie had stayed in. The last time they'd visited, Alice had been visibly pregnant, Cyrus beaming proudly at her all the time. They were lost too, now, unreachable with the Rabbit out of commission. Percy might wake soon, or it might take days, even weeks - his wife, though steadfastly hopeful, hadn't made any prediction.

The doors swung open. With grim determination, Ana rifled through what the couple had left behind - clothes, weapons, knickknacks, everything they hadn't wanted to take home. 

There wasn't too much, and it didn't take long: there it was, tucked away in a drawer. Heart clenched in hope, Ana reached into the drawer, lifting the little golden compass on her palm. 

_Will_ , she thought, and _please_ , and _oh, please_ , again.

The compass needle began to move, first spinning around, then swinging from side to side like a pendulum, then whirring in circles again.

Ana stared at it, and stared, and stared, and it kept going; it never stopped.

It never stopped.

  


* * *

  


Ana's eyes were red. She studied her face in the mirror, blotchy and swollen, dark rings under wet eyes, a blood vessel ruptured in her left eye. That wouldn't do; she couldn't go to council like that. A little magic took the blood-red spot from her eye; make-up would do the rest.

Council mattered, she reminded herself. For fighting the Duchess, and for Wonderland in general. But all she could think of was Will.

She was still scouring through every book she had for some magic that might help her find him, but she'd come up empty. They all had. The soldiers sent out to sweep the cities and the countryside had turned up not a hint of Will. No one knew anything - not the Caterpillar; not the fairy; not the Duchess's minion they'd captured. No trace of Will, either, at any of the Duchess's homes. Still, all Ana wanted to do was rush out and join the searches herself, scour the countryside until she found _something_. 

No, she told herself; she had to defeat the Duchess, and _then_ she'd find out where Will was.

Doggedly, she put on her face. Step by step, foundation and powder and eyeshadow, lipstick and rouge, all by sheer habit. Then she looked up.

She'd put on the Red Queen's face.

It looked calm and in control, and it was a familiar mask. She knew she could hold on to herself, with that face. She wanted to keep it. But she couldn't show them this, couldn't slide back into this comfortable, terrible armour and hope to keep her alliances, hope to protect her people.

She hadn't _cared_ about people when she'd been the Red Queen, had been cruel and thoughtless and willing to take whatever she wanted. But then, she'd always known she meant to rewrite history, and none of it would ever have happened. Now, everything counted, and she had so much to make up for. 

Wonderland had been a prison, from the moment she'd come here with Will. They'd hoped for better; they'd found worse - a world of wondering what they'd done to deserve being there. Not too long after, Ana had earned her stay. She'd come to it innocent, once, but now, she owed too much.

Lately, she'd thought it could become something else. But without Will ...

Ana looked at herself for a moment longer, eyes dry. Eventually she wiped off the lipstick, and most of the blush. There - with soft pink lips in place of the stark, bloody red, it was a different face again. Hair open, and she might get away with the sleight-of-hand.

But still, close enough. Close enough for a mask.

  


* * *

  


The White Rabbit woke from his coma, eventually. Briefly first, and too out of it to even speak clearly, but getting better.

Not well enough to be useful, though.

 _Get up!_ Ana screamed at him, internally. _Get up, I need you to find Will!_ Out loud, she said nothing. 

The Rabbit's wife looked at her with sharp eyes, seeing everything.

But she wasn't sorry.

  


* * *

  


_Yes, yes, yes,_ bounced and echoed in her brain, incoherently, gleefully. Finally, she was there.

One magical confrontation had ended in a stalemate; the second hadn't. Courtesy of a little peppery vengeance - a debilitating curse in the Duchess's favourite soup - there she was now, all knocked out and in Anastasia's hands.

Locked up tight and magic-drained, she had nothing left, nothing to offer opposition to Ana at all.

The White Queen pulled herself up, back ramrod straight and eyes unflinching. She blazed into the Duchess's cell all fury and retribution, in her whitest dress and her reddest lipstick, seething with triumph, seething with anger.

Finally, _finally_ , she would find Will.

The Duchess, just woken, looked up. Her face was ugly with hatred. "Well, if it isn't the Red Queen," she sneered.

"Red or White, I'm still the Queen, darling," Ana drawled. She was better at sneering, too. "And whatever you did with my husband, wherever you hid him from me, I promise you, I'll grind you into dust and _sieve_ it from your remains if I have to."

The Duchess's face went utterly slack for a moment; then she suddenly laughed, a clattering, brittle sound, like glass breaking on stone. "You still believe that?"

Ana lifted her hand, pointedly, showing off the fireball forming on her palm. "This isn't a game, darling."

"Oh, Your Majesty, that's where you're wrong." Another brittle laugh. "It's a very entertaining game, and you're performing so well. I do wish I'd thought of taking him myself, truly I do. But whoever took him, I wish them all the joy." A sly expression came over her face, and her pointy chin came up smugly. "Or perhaps he just left you, _darling_. Shouldn't surprise me, shouldn't surprise me at all." She leaned forward as far as her bonds allowed, her eyes bright with cruel mirth. "And I hope you never see him again!"

Ana stared at her, eyes hard. Whatever she had to do, she'd do. Her white dress, stained with blood ... well, why not? This was no chess game; there were no sides to her. The Red Queen was the White Queen; the White King was a Knave. (And refused to become too kingly, for which Ana was truly grateful, because that wouldn't be him, now would it?) She steeled herself, stepped closer.

Holding her simmering magic in check was the hardest part. Magic was emotion, after all, and what she _wanted_ was to lash out, brutal and fast, to smash the Duchess into pieces.

That wouldn't help, though. And Ana was supposed to be above futile gestures of rage these days, wasn't she?

She had a hard time remembering that just now.

The Duchess looked up at her, brightly, and she spread her arms a little, as if to say, _come get me._ Ana looked into her eyes and found ... yes, challenge and defiance, but something else, too, underneath. 

"This is the best joke I've had in years," the Duchess said, and started laughing again. An ironic amusement, perfectly genuine somehow.

Ana gasped, and with sudden, devastating clarity she realised the Duchess was telling the truth. She didn't have him. She'd never had him. Ana had been looking in the wrong place, all this time.

_Will ..._

Her hands clenched, and she let out a breath very slowly, feeling the burn of the fireball above her palm. She lifted it higher, letting it warm her face. The only warmth she had left. She raised her hand for the throw.

The fire singed the Duchess's hair as it flew over her shoulder, slamming into the wall behind her.

The Duchess kept laughing, hysterical and shattering, even as Ana turned on her heel and left.


	3. Interlude: Will Scarlet

Coffee, strong and black and generously spiked from Will's flask. It's what keeps him going. Will slumps in his booth, keeping a wary eye on the door, trying not to think.

Failing.

_With all your friends? Alice and the White Rabbit?_

The blonde sheriff's taunt still echoes in his mind, days later. She didn't know, of course, couldn't've. But telling himself that isn't helping.

Will's out of lock-up, and pardoned, even, but still in prison. Storybrooke's a prison, cursed and enclosed, town line and ice wall and all. He's not getting sprung this time, either - the Rabbit's not coming for him. No one's coming.

And no breaking out.

What does he care, anyway? There's nowhere for him to go. Nowhere he'd want to go.

What was he thinking? Being happy. Being with Ana. White Queen, White King. Fixing Wonderland. Joke's on him, there.

That brings back the image again, the last thing he saw before ... Before. He squeezes his eyes tight against it, but no use. He's seen it before, what the Duchess's magic can do - he's seen the result, people sneezing out their own lungs, their own brains. And Ana was hit straight in the chest ...

No. He doesn't want to think of her like that.

Will pours another from his flask and tosses it back, lunch and dinner, and breakfast, too, most days. _What've you got to lose, Will?_ Not a thing.

Not a thing.

The door opens, and Will slouches further into his corner, but it's only some woman he doesn't know, going for coffee. Will tunes out her small-talk with Granny, grateful for being left alone.

Yeah. If they'd all just leave him alone he could handle this, could deal with himself, somehow. Could live with it, even, if you want to call it living. A thief, a prisoner, a desperate man. If they'd just leave him to get drunk on his own, leave him to do his thieving and his grieving in peace ...

Not about to happen, is it? He's never had that kind of luck, even at the worst of times when he really could have used some.

So of course the sheriff - blonde sheriff - has a grudge against him for ruining her date. Half-eaten pop tarts, now that's cruel and unusual. Worthy of Wonderland, almost.

Will flinches at the thought, takes another gulp from his cup. After another refill from his flask, the traces of coffee are microscopic, but he's drinking from a cup, so it still counts.

Yeah, the sheriff. And other sheriff's wife, who's the mayor, apparently. And then there's Robin - Robin bloody Hood - wanting to talk about Marian. What else is new?

All of them talking at him, and he runs off his mouth, of course, because that's what he does.

 _It's worth it,_ Will remembers himself saying. _It's always worth it._

Yeah.


	4. Part 2: Anastasia

Ana curled up on her bed, sobbing. Who cared about the Duchess; she could rot in that dungeon for all Ana cared. She didn't have Will. 

After everything she'd tried, that had been her only hope, the one she'd clung to, and now ... now ...

Her head felt packed in cotton wool. This wasn't real. This couldn't be real.

A knock on the door rattled harshly into the fog in her head. Ana made herself sit up, wipe her face. Reluctantly she called, "Come." 

It was Tweedledum, carrying another set of magic-related books. They'd been piling up in her rooms for a while.

"We found some more in the Duchess's castle," the Tweedle said, sounding embarrassed.

Ana waved at him to bring them over, and then nearly ripped them from his hands. Maybe there would be something new in there; maybe ...

She tried to suppress another sniffle as she waved Tweedledum away. 

Why he was loyal to her, she'd never understood. He'd even betrayed his own brother for her. True, Tweedledee had been working for Jafar - and just about the only thing that could be said for the Red Queen back then had been that she wasn't as bad as Jafar. Still, Tweedledum had simply been ... loyal, for reasons of his own.

She'd never deserved it, not then and not now. 

Obedient as ever, the Tweedle reluctantly withdrew, a strange, helpless expression on his immaculately painted face. Ana put him out of her mind and turned to the new books.

There had to be something, somewhere. Because if not, what would she do?

  


* * *

  


The White Rabbit was walking with a cane. He'd recovered well, his wife said, and would get better, but he still struggled on his feet, his balance uncertain.

It wasn't enough.

Anastasia glared down at him. His ears drooped. 

"I'm sorry, Your Majesty," he said. "I swear to you I tried."

 _"Try again."_ Slow and drawled and dangerous. Ana recognised her voice - the Red Queen's voice. But it was that or scream in frustration.

It wasn't the first time he'd tried to open a portal. He _was_ a dimensional traveller, a natural one - he could go anywhere. And he could _find_ people, however he did it. 

When he'd woken up, when he'd started getting better, she'd hoped -

"Don't you overstrain him," the Grey Rabbit said sternly. Her glare told another story entirely - a different warning, a reminder to the Queen. 

Ana struggled not to snarl at her in return. Yes, she'd urged him to try once more, and she'd do it again. He couldn't create rabbit holes _now_ , but surely it would come back. 

It had to.

"He's only just barely recovered from the Duchess's curse," the rabbit-woman added, resentfully. "He needs rest, not this."

"Not so recovered, though, is he?" Ana snapped, then managed to catch herself, wrestling her grief under control. It was getting harder every day. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, both of you - but Will ..."

The Grey Rabbit's face softened a little. "I know, Your Majesty. And if Percy could help, he would. You know that."

Yes. She did know. Her mask slipped a little. "Will it come back?" Ana asked, desperately.

The rabbits looked at each other uncomfortably. "I don't know," the White Rabbit said eventually. "It's never happened before." He rolled his shoulders, put more weight on his cane, and looked at his feet.

_Sorry, Rabbit. I know it's your body, your powers, your loss. But Will ..._

"The Duchess's curse did a lot of damage," the Grey Rabbit added, then shrugged, noncommittally. What else could she say?

No rabbit holes, maybe never again. Ana wanted to shake the Rabbit until his powers clicked back in place. Not that that was likely to happen. She'd been so hoping ...

But all she was left with was another door closed to her.

"I'm sorry," she said again, and turned around, walking away, not letting the rabbits see the tears running down her face.

  


* * *

  


Ana stared at the page open before her. She'd known, she'd _known_ she'd find something eventually, in one of those magic books. But she hadn't expected anything quite like this.

 _True Love's Dream._

She could cast that; she knew she could. She could almost feel the power gather in her finger tips, could taste the flavour of the transmuted potion.

She'd be with Will. Even if Will was dead, she'd be with Will. This curse could reunite true love, anywhere, across time and space, life and death. 

A bittersweet smile. Unlike most, Ana knew for certain that Will and she shared true love, in the most magical sense; Will had proved it by breaking Jafar's curse with a simple kiss. Her throat tightened at the memory.

And this .... She'd be with him; they'd be together. Forever, nothing and no one able to rip them apart again.

But there was a reason it was a curse, after all. Of course there was. 

She'd fall unconscious, never to wake, and they'd be together in her dream. She'd be with him in her dream, while and he lived on - if he did live - wherever he happened to be, joining her every night as he fell asleep.

It was an ending of sorts, and perhaps a proper one for her, not happy perhaps, but less than unhappy at least. From where she was now, that seemed like a very good thing indeed.

But.

But she wouldn't be able to keep looking. If she cast this curse, she wouldn't be able to do anything at all. Whatever had happened to Will, she'd never find out. And she'd be with him, but she would never _find_ him.

Will deserved better, didn't he?

Her heart clenching, tears running down her face, she slammed the book closed and threw it against the nearest wall, tossing a fireball right after it.

Watching it go up in flame. Burning it to cinders, leaving ashes in her heart.

  


* * *

  


Ana approached the Well of Wonders with trepidation. She hadn't told anyone she was going here, had in fact left her own castle quietly in the night, sneaking out - not very queenlike, but then, she wasn't feeling particularly queenly these days.

She knew this was dangerous, knew what the Nyx had done to Cyrus and his brothers. The Nyx had exacted retribution a thousandfold for just a little water taken in despair to save a dying mother; she was far from a benevolent spirit. And yet Ana owed her her life. Without the Nyx's gift, she would have been dead after Alice and her no-longer-a-genie had undone Jafar's spell. 

She'd never spoken to the Nyx, had never thanked her for it. She owed the powerful being a heavy debt, and there was no way to repay it. 

Heart beating harshly, Ana stepped onto the stones bordering the Well. "Nyx?" she called out quietly. "Are you there? I would like to speak to you."

Like a fountain, dark water rose from the pool, up and up to the size of a human being, and it shaped itself into the frame of a woman, water running down from her like a living spring. Her lips were slightly parted, and water ran from them, too. The Nyx's head tilted to the side, and dark, unreadable eyes fixed on Ana.

"White Queen," her watery voice said, though her lips didn't move.

"I ..." Ana trailed off, then started again. "Thank you for your gift. I owe you my life."

"Your time had not come," the Nyx said. "Your time was not done."

Time done. Prison, all right. Ana swallowed. "I was hoping ..." She bit her lip; she knew this was presumptuous, and therefore dangerous. But there wasn't anyone else else to turn to. "I was hoping you might be willing to help me again. Will, the Knave ... the White King ... he was taken by powerful magic, and we don't know what happened to him, and we can't find him anywhere. Please," she pleaded. "I know your waters connect through many lands. Can you tell me anything? Can you find him?"

Ana hadn't meant to ask that last; she'd only meant to ask for information. She'd let herself get carried away, and now she looked at the Nyx with burning eyes, hope and fear warring in her heart.

She wasn't ashamed to admit to herself she was more than a little afraid of the water-spirit.

The Nyx stared at her, head tilting slowly from one side to the other. "You did not attempt to steal my waters," she said after a long, stomach-clenching silence.

Would that have helped her? Ana couldn't think how. "I know better," she said, cautiously. Anyone who'd known Cyrus and his story would.

"Is your work done, White Queen?"

Ana flinched. She'd not let herself think about that, not in a while. But she hadn't forgotten. "No," she whispered, looking down. 

"The Waters are everywhere," the Nyx said, her voice cool and unreadable. "The Well of Wonders reaches all places and all times. It could take you there, too."

"He's alive?" Ana asked, breathless, her heart beating in her throat. "Is that what you're saying? He's alive?"

"Alive, and far from here," the Nyx said. "The Waters can take you to him. But you must do it now. Jump into the pool now, and know you will never return."

Ana took an eager step forward to the very edge of the pool; then her thinking mind caught up. "Wait. Never return? You mean to Wonderland?"

The Nyx's watery head inclined slightly. "Now, or never," she said, arms spreading out in invitation. Water gushed from her hands in streams, a living fountain.

Will! She needed him. And never to return, that was tempting - Wonderland was her prison and her parole, and without Will, it would never be anything more. She'd leave everything behind, the White Queen's kingdom and her life, to be someone else, somewhere else. 

Gladly.

But she hadn't done enough. And she'd be leaving that, too - all people she'd wronged, everyone she'd been trying to make amends to. The people the Red Queen had terrorised, or exploited, or even just neglected in their suffering. The people she owed.

She'd leave them to the likes of the Duchess, or the Caterpillar, or whoever else would take power after she left. How could she do that?

With Will only a step away, how could she not?

She'd been so young when she'd run away with Will. She'd thought jumping into another world would bring them happiness, and all it had brought was despair. If they'd stayed, maybe they could have made it on their own, even with her mother's disapproval.

Ana hadn't been as young when she'd lost Will, when she'd decided that rewriting history was her only chance to get him back. She'd been desperate, and it had made her cruel, and she'd moved forward because stopping would have meant acknowledging everything she'd done.

Later, against Jafar, after she'd recognised she had to stop him - yes, then she'd stood her ground, hadn't run from Wonderland with Will, even though she could have forced him. But he'd told her she wouldn't stay, so of course she had. For the first time, she hadn't run, and they'd _won_. She'd never regretted not running then.

And now ...

Now, she definitely would regret it.

_Will ..._

Feeling dead inside, Ana stepped back.

Suddenly the Nyx's lips did move, curling into the creepiest smile Ana had ever seen. "Remain on your path, White Queen," she said, and with the last word, her body and her waters fell in onto themselves, flowing back into the pool.

Ana sat on stones by the well, crying, her tears soaking through her handkerchief and her sleeves, and it was a long time before she could bring herself to get up again.

  


* * *

  


"We didn't expect to see you here," the Grey Rabbit said, repressively. She smoothed her headscarf, then pointedly crossed her arms over her chest.

"Now, now," the White Rabbit said, sinking into an armchair. He'd recovered well, but still used a cane for balance. "You can see something happened."

The rabbit couple threw twin assessing looks at Anastasia.

Ana was sitting on the floor in the Rabbits' small house, her skirts pooling around her, elbows resting on her knees. She felt exhausted and empty. "I went to see the Nyx," she said.

Percy's ears came up, and his wife took an involuntary step backwards, her hands falling down to her sides. "You didn't ... do anything, did you?" she asked.

Rolling her eyes would have been too much of an effort. "He isn't in Wonderland," Ana said. Only that; she wasn't going to mention the rest. Her hand came up to wipe at her eyes again; she clenched her fingers against the movement. Her eyes were red enough. 

The twin looks turned to pity.

"Something took Will right out of Wonderland?" the rabbit-woman said, sounding reluctantly impressed. "I didn't believe it. What could have taken him, just like that?"

The White Rabbit's ears twitched, and he grimaced. "Well, it happened once before."

Ana gasped. She hadn't thought - she hadn't realised -

Will _had_ told her about the land without magic, and the people cursed there by the Evil Queen. Alice and Cyrus had talked about that strange place once, too, but Will had never wanted to dwell on it. 

It made sense. Of course it made sense. But - "What kind of dark magic would it take?" Ana asked. "To cast that curse _again_? From what I'd heard, it was one of the darkest."

Percy nodded at her, ears flopping sadly. "I'm sorry," he said. "I wish I could ..."

"Yes, yes," Ana snapped, impatiently. "There has to be something else! We know where he is - there has to be a way to get there!"

They turned to each other, the White Rabbit and the Grey, then looked away. Ana's fist closed around a bunch of fabric from her skirts. There had to be something they could to.

"There are many ways to travel between realms," Percy said after a moment. "But all magic has a price, and I don't think that place would be cheap."

No. No, Ana didn't think so, either. And she'd already refused to pay the Nyx's price ... or rather, hadn't failed the Nyx's test. It had to have been a test - and if she'd taken the offer, what dark fate might she have brought upon herself? No; she couldn't imagine that all-powerful being would have been so kind as to let her walk away from Wonderland, let her walk out of prison and into Will's arms.

She rested her cheek on her knees, trying to calm her breathing. "We'll find something," she said, hating how unsure she sounded. "We find out its price. And then we decide whether it's worth it."

The Grey Rabbit looked at her with something akin to pity. "And if not?"

Ana closed her eyes, tired. 

"Then we find another way," Percy added, firmly. His wife threw him a glare, but he continued, "There always is one, isn't there?"

Ana let out a desperate, bitter sob. "You actually believe that?"

"You've believed more impossible things before."

"What do you mean?" Ana asked.

There was an edge to the White Rabbit's voice. "You believed you could get Will back, if only you learned how to break the rules of magic." 

Ana's eyes snapped open, and she glared at Percy. "But that didn't happen," she said eventually.

"No, but you and Will still found each other again. You got him back anyway."

Ana swallowed around the lump in her throat, and wiped her sleeve over her nose again. 

_Don't give me hope, Rabbit. What'll I do when I find you're wrong?_

But still, she'd found him again once. She'd used up all her luck, most likely ... but it was good to be reminded that good things did happen, even to her.

"Come back to the castle?" Ana eventually asked the couple. A deep breath. "Please? I need you at Council. And ..." A small, helpless, aborted gesture.

Percy looked at his wife. The Grey Rabbit twitched her nose, considering, then lifted her hand in agreement. They both turned toward Ana, nodding in unison.

  


* * *

  


Wonderland lived on. Anastasia lived on. Every day she donned the White Queen's mask, went to Council, held audiences, _did her bloody job_ , the way the White Queen should.

Ever night she walked the gardens, alone.

Her eyes were dry. She couldn't even cry any more, and somehow that made it all the worse.

She was still searching, but it was an empty, hopeless search already. What would it be in a month, or a year, or a decade? Ana tried to imagine herself in that future. It strangled her, iron bands around her chest, her neck. It was all she had to look forward to, now.

If only she'd taken the Nyx's offer ... damn the price. But she'd tried to do the right thing, and had cut herself off.

She was cut off from Will, and she'd done it to herself.

She'd never find a way to the land without magic, would she? Of course she wouldn't. She'd never find Will again.

Another queen, back in the Enchanted Forest, had cursed her entire realm there. But the price of that curse ...

"Well, I couldn't cast that curse if I wanted to, now could I?" Ana muttered to herself. "What with Will being _not here_ , and oh yes, if he were there would be no need!"

A sob - dry, tearless. 

Maybe she deserved this. Maybe that was why the Nyx had offered her a way out. Maybe she'd known she wouldn't take it, and curse herself for it later.

Maybe _that_ was her punishment.

Ana steeled herself to go back inside. She'd call for the Tweedle, and she'd get some more work done trying to figure out the Caterpillar's latest plans.

Yes. That was what she was going to do. 

She closed her eyes for a moment. Just another moment, then she'd ...

Lumps of dirt spattered her as the ground exploded before her. Ana threw up an arm in defence and opened her eyes.

The White Rabbit stood before her, just emerged from a hole. "It's back!" He beamed at her, ears flailing in excitement. "My powers are back!"


	5. Epilogue: Will Scarlet

Well. That's a bit awkward, isn't it? Robin and the Evil Queen. Thanks, but no thanks - Will isn't interested one bit in meeting her. When Robin calls her to the library, he skips out.

Walking down the street, fists stuffed into the pockets of his jacket and lost in his thoughts, he nearly runs into some bloke before he notices: there's a small crowd outside Granny's, and they're not happy.

Well, it's Storybrooke. No surprise there.

Will edges back. Right. He'll find some other place to park himself for a while.

The crowd shifts. A voice half-heard through the angry rumblings of the crowd, and out of the corner of his eye, through too many bodies in between, a glimpse of blonde hair -

_\- it can't be, no, it can't -_

\- Will pushes forward, elbows and feet, wedging himself between people, forward, _through_ -

\- and bursts out from the crowd, arms flailing, stumbling even as he breaks free from the bodies in front, catching just a glimpse of her face before he goes sailing to the ground face-first, coming to rest at her feet.

Of course he does.

But she's laughing, so that's all right.

Anastasia is here, large as life and twice as real as anything in this place, standing right here in Storybrooke, the White Rabbit beside her and in the tarmac, one of those holes the Rabbit's method of travelling makes. And she's _laughing_ at him. It's bubbling out of her, watery and happy and so bright ... The knot in Wills chest dissolves, and he almost wipes his eyes.

Almost, because he can't bear to look away from her even that long.

The crowd's mutters behind him turn puzzled, but he doesn't give them any mind, just looks up at her, looks. And looks.

"You don't have to laugh at me," he complains, beaming up at her.

Ana holds out both her hands, and he reaches up for them. And then they stop for a long moment, simply holding hands, she standing and he half sitting, half lying on the ground, taking in each other's presence. Then she tugs a little, and Will gets his feet under him, pulling himself up by her arms.

"I thought you were dead," he says.

"I thought I'd lost you," she says.

And then Will can't say anything any more, because his face is mashed into Ana's shoulder, and they're hugging, and laughing and crying, and any moment now they'll be kissing, except they need to get their fill first, little touches, her fingers brushing his cheek, his hand hesitantly closing around her shoulder. Half-way between tentative and frantic, it's Will's whole world, right now.

Except some bloke more daring than the rest comes forward, pokes Will in the shoulder. "Who the hell is she?"

Will can't even work up some proper annoyance. "My wife," he says, not looking anywhere but at Ana. Not that he can't guess what they'd thought, with her just popping up like that. "Nothing to do with the Snow Queen, mate. Now go away, got a reunion to celebrate here."

"Too right we do," Ana says, and then her hands are framing his face, pulling him closer.

A moment later they've already forgotten about the crowd still watching them in increasing bafflement.

  


* * *

  


"Are you all right?" Ana asks quietly, a long time later.

He is. He is now. "You?" he asks back.

She looks away from him for the first time. "I nearly ..." Her voice is a harsh whisper, and she swallows before continuing. "I nearly did some things. You were gone, Will. First I thought the Duchess had you, and then I didn't know ... and I ..."

"I don't care."

"Yes, you do." With conviction. "You did last time. Of course you did."

He remembered, only too well. She'd left him behind, made herself over into the Red Queen. Had become a tyrant, like someone he'd never known. "But you didn't." He knows she didn't, not this time, not again. It's clear as day in her eyes.

And what if she had? Maybe it should worry him, just how little he cares when he has her in his arms. It should, shouldn't it? But he doesn't give a damn. There's no room in this moment for anything but _this_.

"Gave up too easily, then, didn't I? We both did," Will amends. "Not gonna do that again."

"Never again," she agrees, voice shaky but strong, a promise and a vow.

He pulls her close again, desperately.

Eventually, Will realises they're still standing right outside Granny's. Even with the crowd mostly dispersed, they're drawing attention.

Eventually, Will notices the White Rabbit, leaning on a cane and beaming up at them like a proud father or something. "Hey, Percy," Will says, not eloquently but heartfelt, dislodging a hand from Ana's waist and holding it out. The Rabbit squeezes it briefly.

Ana is warm and alive and real in his arms, and he's not letting go. Never, never letting go again.

Two people he thought he'd never see again, and it'll be more soon, won't it? "Can we just go home?" he asks, a little plaintively, and Ana laughs again. He feels her body shaking with it.

"No one you want to say good-bye to, here?" Ana asks after a moment.

The petulant _no_ from the back of his mind is instinctive, but Will hesitates, thinking for a moment. "Give us a mo, Rabbit," he says, and pulls Ana with him into Granny's.

"Got pen and paper I can borrow?" Will asks.

Granny gives him an unimpressed look, but complies.

Will thinks for a moment. _It's always worth it,_ he writes eventually. _Sometimes everything even works out. Good luck, mate._ He signs, folds the piece of paper - perhaps more often than strictly necessary - and hands it back to Granny. "Mind giving this to Robin Hood?"

She takes it with a huff, and Will pulls Ana outside again immediately, to where the White Rabbit waits, and then they're off. Down the rabbit hole, and a moment later - home.


End file.
